


How to Save Your Transports: Explain

by MueraRashaye



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last of the Jedi (2017)
Genre: Fix-It, For Want of a Nail, Gen, Spoilers, communication is key, seriously spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 09:09:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13050936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MueraRashaye/pseuds/MueraRashaye
Summary: Vice-Admiral Holdo knew now-Captain Dameron had been demoted for good reason. She knew he was smarting over that, smarting over now being ground-bound and one of their few remaining pilots, and desperate for action.Why, in Force's name, would she NOT explain the plan to him, or at least give him a hint that there WAS  plan, there WAS a strategy, and his aid was NOT needed? He had charisma, he had influence and he was a heroic figure with the rank and file - if he blatantly didn't trust her, didn't respect her, people would lose faith in her, experience and chain of command aside. So she explains.An AU running The Last Jedi's Resistance plot-arc from Holdo's conversation with Poe on.





	How to Save Your Transports: Explain

**Author's Note:**

> While I did enjoy the movie, I couldn't help but notice the glaring plot hole - and more critically, the fact that if Rose and Finn hadn't gone off on their adventure, THE CLOAKED TRANSPORTS WOULD HAVE WORKED.
> 
> Also, do we still not have autopilot in the future?! COME ON GUYS!

“Vice-Admiral Holdo!”

She turned her head and raised an eyebrow at the flyboy walking up to her, looking anxious and trying to hide it behind a confident mask. Judging by some of the sidelong glances and the way a path was cleared for him, his mask was working and he was respected, even if he let his heroics get in the way of sound tactics.

_All_ of their bombers were _gone_ , and yes, they had taken out a Dreadnaught, but damn it all they could have used those bombers later, even if they couldn’t use them _now_ , but he had to be a hero and save the fleet from the momentary setback, from the threat of the moment, not the threat of tomorrow. General Organa had demoted him to Captain and it was well-done of her, though unfortunately it was doubtful he’d had the chance to really think over why she’d done it and why it was appropriate, instead running headlong into their latest disaster.

“I’m Commander Poe Dameron, and first I wanted to say that was a wonderful speech,” he said, Holdo managing to restrain her reaction to a faint smile when she really wanted to roll her eyes. First, he used the incorrect rank – fair, the demotion was recent. Second, she could practically _hear_ the cut off ‘if it wasn’t just pretty words’. Flyboys – to think she’d once been just as bad.

“But it would be nice to know if there was a plan beside inch away at sublight speed until we run out of fuel,” he concluded, finally sounding a little concerned and looking between her and the specs she had been reviewing and having summarized for her.

“There is, Captain,” she said, keeping the emphasis on the rank subtle and by the tightening of the man’s jaw, there was no need for her next jab but she would make it anyway. “General Organa’s last act of command was demoting you, and the tragedy that occurred has not counteracted that or let it be forgotten.”

“Yes, Vice-Admiral. My apologies,” he bit out, and she nodded shortly, turning to the display and pointing.

“That planet is our goal,” she said, “There is an old rebel base there, with some supplies and shielding – and enough power to get out a transmission to our allies. The current plan is to approach at full speed, taking the time to load up transports with everything we can. By the time the planet is within range of the transports, we’ll likely have lost the medical frigate and our support ship – their evacuations are already underway.”

“The transports are unshielded, though, Vice-Admiral. Wouldn’t they just shoot them down?”

There was a lot more respect in his voice already, but she didn’t bother to smile. He’d gotten used to knowing every detail, or at least a lot of details, under General Organa and if he’d just learned proper respect for chain of command she wouldn’t have to be taking the time to explain a plan  _already known_ by the command staff to this random pilot. But she knew Dameron’s personality profile, and she knew he had high influence with the rank and file. If she didn’t explain the plan to him, word would spread that she had no plan and they were all going to die when they ran out of fuel in the middle of nowhere, and she’d have a mutiny on her hands.

Wasting some time now would save time and lives later.

“That is why they’ll be cloaked,” she said shortly. “The goal is for the First Order to think the main body of the Resistance has died when this ship is destroyed, the transports carrying us to the base undetected, and we will be able to regroup and strike from the shadows afterwards. Resurrected heroes carry a lot of weight.”

“Oh,” Dameron blinked slightly, looking between her and the displays and not saying anything while she started to work on the details of organizing a fleet-wide evacuation that would make the First Order think they were scrambling for time and doomed, not scrambling for time and _plotting_. It was a delicate balance.

“Thank you for explaining, Vice-Admiral,” he murmured, saluting.

“Hmm. See to it that people know there is a plan, and foolish heroics, no matter how inspiring, will not be appreciated. Thank you, Captain,” she said, returning the gesture and dismissing him. He didn’t quite wince, but he looked vaguely repentant so she would consider it a win. With any luck, he’d learn something from this, and he’d learn to _think_. They could use better and more members of High Command, and fighter pilot commanders, when they could get their head out of the fumes and start strategizing on a bigger scale, weren’t terrible at it.

Thank the Force she’d had the chance to explain it. Who knows what mad idea he’d have come up with later?

***===***pagebreak***===***

Staring at Dameron, she thanked every higher power she’d ever heard of that she’d explained her strategy to the man because sweet suns this could have been a  _disaster_ if he’d decided to go through with it out of desperation and ignorance.  While she was at it, thank every higher power he’d asked to speak with her in an empty room and that she’d agreed, she didn’t need people hearing about this in the middle of operations. And now he was just staring at her hopefully – what, did he want a pat on the head for not being a blithering idiot? That was expected  _baseline_ behaviour, he’d be getting no commendation for - 

“Thank you, for the recommendation,” she said carefully, looking to the ex-Stormtrooper – actually, they would need to confirm that the man even was part of the Resistance, defection didn’t guarantee he actually wanted to fight. If he’d been raised as a stormtrooper and brainwashed he could very well just want to escape and be a farmer somewhere, maybe serve as a safe-house if he had to.

They could use safe-houses…

Making a mental note to record that for someone to ask after when they weren’t as frantic as now, she nodded to him and to the tech – Rose, though for some reason she couldn’t remember her surname to save her life right now. Her sister had been a bomber tech, had died in Poe’s run – she was probably desperate for some sort of use, for some sort of way to strike back.

“It is a good thought, and if escaping to lightspeed would help us anymore than the current plan, I would seriously consider following up,” she said, wanting to make sure they received some praise for the idea – creative thinking was good – and for passing it along. The plan should have come to someone other than Dameron first, but Finn Trooper – she should make sure someone sat him down and explained why he’d been assigned that second name on paperwork and asked what he wanted instead, mental note two – didn’t know better and didn’t know anyone else to begin with, and Rose was a technician, not a field operative. She’d let it slide for now.

“However, there are far more risks to that strategy than there are benefits, especially with the evacuation to our planetary base depending on cloaking – if there was any hint to the First Order that cloaking was going to happen, they could simply do a wide area barrage and hit some of us, and that would ruin the pretend we’re dead portion of the plan.”

By the relief on the trooper’s face, he really liked the word ‘pretend’. She didn’t blame him, she was rather fond of it herself.

“It is _very_ good to know that you know where to find these sorts of things on a variety of vessels,” she said, speaking directly to Finn. “Please ensure someone from Intelligence interviews you when this is all settled, your knowledge could be vital to future operations. I’ll make a note on your file, but in case that doesn’t transfer, make sure it happens at some point. They can then explain your options – if you wish to officially sign on to the Resistance or if you’d prefer to run a safe-house for us or just get dropped off on the nearest non-First Order planet. There are options beside fighting, in case no one has said that to you.”

“No one has,” the trooper admitted quietly, “But its been very busy. Thank you Vice-Admiral, for explaining. I’ll make sure to talk to Intelligence at some point.”

“Excellent work, all of you. Carry on with your duties.”

The tech and Dameron both nodded and walked off, Finn Trooper making to head after them before hesitating and looking down before looking over at her and very clearly steeling himself.

Anyone else she’d have snapped at to get on with it, and if he took too much longer she’d do the same to him, but for now he was probably still figuring out that asking questions was acceptable. 

“If I want to leave, I’m not a deserter?” he asked.

“If you wanted to leave _right now_ , I’m afraid we wouldn’t be able to let you,” she said carefully, “We need all the transports for the evacuation and the escape pods wouldn’t get you far anyway, and are also unshielded.”

“No, I – I thought about it but that was panic,” he mumbled, wincing, “Sorry Vice-Admiral.”

“You just woke up from a coma after a serious spinal injury after an amazingly chaotic series of days and life-changing decisions,” she said dryly, “Some incoherence is to be expected. But no, Trooper – my apologies, that’s simply the family name picked for you in the paperwork, you can change it – Finn. You are allowed to leave, we do not force anyone to fight. We do force people to stay out of the way of people who _are_ , especially in emergencies like now, but we don’t force people to fight.”

“Oh, I’ll fight,” Finn shrugged, brow furrowed still from her family name comment, “It’s my best chance to survive. I just – wasn’t sure if I _had_ to, or not.”

“You do not. And you can change your mind later,” she assured him, “Try to remember to ask Intelligence about resignations and policies on that, that’s the phrase you would be looking for. You also are currently filed under civilian ally with armed experience, not as a full member of the Resistance, so you’ll want to straighten out that status at some point too. But again, not now.”

“No, not now,” he agreed. “Thank you Vice-Admiral. I have no duties, should I simply find Poe and help him with his?”

“Hmm… no. You’ll be with me. He’s going to be doing lifting, and you haven’t undergone physio. Can you type?”

“Ah – yes?”

“Good. You’ll transcribe and take notes. Here’s a pad,” she said, passing him the one she’d been using to record things herself. It wasn’t truly necessary for comprehensive records so she’d done what she could herself, the usual aides had been killed in the attack on the bridge and every able bodied person needed to help with the evacuation. But even though Finn had evidently recovered well, there was no need to let all their hard work go to waste and tear his muscles or damage him further – he’d gotten a basic medical assessment if she remembered right, but muscular atrophy would still be a problem. “Transcribe what is going on, if you have questions, note them down and ask when there’s a quiet moment. I’ll try to remember to check in with you, but there might not be time.”

“Yes Vice-Admiral,” Finn agreed, taking the pad and stylus and sounding unaccountably relieved to have something to do.

*** ===***pagebreak***===***

“There goes the last support ship – where are we on loading the transports?” she asked, spotting Finn recording the time of the explosion and the numbers of successful evacuees that had just finished reeling off. She’d had the chance to review some of his notes and they were very thorough, later analysts would have plenty of things to work with. He even recorded some of her better quotes – if anyone wrote a biography of her they’d be spoiled for choice.

He’d also written questions on the inset notes application and the few times she’d been able to check in, he’d only asked the ones that were relevant for his note-taking. The ones she spotted when she’d looked at them had been filled with questions to ask about resignations and safe-houses and repaying medical and and hyperspeed tactics - 

Something there was tickling at her mind and she let it go while she listened to the status report. Not much longer, and they were well within range of the transports engines if they had to leave now. Cloaking algorithms were in place too, so it really was just the physical act of loading that was delaying them.

“Start topping off their fuel reserves,” she ordered, “Within the next hour I want personnel to begin loading.”

There was a quiet moment as people rushed about following her new orders and her standing orders, Finn quietly observing at her side. “Questions, Finn?” she prompted, looking over the various stations and keeping an eye and ear out for problems so she could cut them off before the y grew.

“Shields aren’t designed to deflect near-hyperspace or hyperspace speed things,” he said carefully, “It’s one of the reasons Starkiller took so long to build, the beam had to be capable of hyperspace for planetary shields to be rendered useless.”

“Yes,” she agreed, wondering where this was going.

“If a ship is in real-space, and another ship is traveling in hyperspace through that area, would the real-space ship be affected?”

Physics questions – she really wanted to know where this was going, because that idea was getting louder, just not loud enough for her to tell what exactly was going on - 

“Not usually, no, though if the real-space ship jumped to hyperspace at the wrong time, there could be a collision within hyperspace- likewise of the hyperspace ship descended to real-space. That’s why calculations are made and sensors have to be deployed before every jump.”

“Right – so what if when the transports left we turned this ship around and jumped to almost-hyperspace speeds at the First Order fleet?” Finn asked. “Would the through-shielding property hold?”

“Write a note to give you a commendation for creative thinking,” she ordered, turning on her heel and striding to astronavigation. “I need you to design a route that turns this ship around and launches towards the First Order at near-enough to hyperspace speeds that we penetrate the shields, but still cause damage.”

“Easy,” the navigator shrugged, exchanging glances with his colleague, “With as low as our fuel reserves are going to be after topping off the transports, there won’t be enough to make a full hyperspace jump. You’d be able to get close enough to burn through shields, but there’d still be enough matter occupying real-space to cause some disastrous explos… oh! Could be difficult to program an autopilot to do it, Vice-Admiral, the requirements for autopilot routes are fairly rigorous.”

“See if it can be done,” she said, waving the helmsman over and explaining what she needed and leaving the two of them to it, “Worst come to worst someone can stay behind and launch it,” she informed Finn, “But either way this could cause serious damage to the First Order and distract them from investigating nearby planets – and look exactly like a last-ditch attempt to avenge ourselves. Well thought, Finn.”

His shoulders twitched in an approximation of a shrug, saying quietly, “I remember something similar from studying the Thrawn campaigns. Thought I should mention it. Sorry I didn’t remember before the other two ships died.”

“We wouldn’t have wanted them to do this anyway,” she assured him, “Better for more mass to launch – the more mass we have, the more that’s left in real-space to collide with them, and it’s a plan that would really only work once, they could always put more effort into killing us than they currently are. Half of this strategy is working because they’re enjoying imagining all of us slowly succumbing to despair.”

“Ah,” Finn said, wrapping up his latest surge of notes. She’d inspect them their next quiet moment, she needed to make sure he included that commendation because this would work so very well, but it looked like some tensions were rising over at the station managing transport fueling and she needed to cut that off at the start.

She heard him snag someone in the background and murmur, “Med-center is overdue for reporting progress, who’d check on that?”

“That Lieutenant, I’ll relay,” the ensign he’d grabbed replied, carrying her box past them.

Checking the chrono, she raised an eyebrow because the med-center was five minutes overdue and she hadn’t realized – apparently no one had except Finn. Well done, ex-trooper.

Hmm… her family always had been sad there was no one to carry on the family name through her, and he seemed competent enough. Dameron would offer too, she was sure, but he could use choices. Holdo was a common name in the Mid-Rim too, so it would give him a place to blend in – hells, some of her distant cousins were in the First Order and fully supported Snoke, no one would finger a Holdo as Resistance on name alone.

Finn Holdo. He could do worse.

Now to make sure as many transports made it as possible - 

“General!” she heard, and she whipped around, letting herself beam at the sight of their General – General _Organa_ she’d survived being _spaced_ \- 

Striding forward and reaching out, she gripped her hands tightly and said, “General Organa – it is so good to see you awake.”

“Good to be here,” she said shortly, returning the grip with a smile before scanning the area, “Evacuation plan is proceeding?”

“Indeed,” she said, “And calculations are running on adding a dramatic suicide run to near-hyperspace.”

“Elegant,” an unfamiliar voice said and she didn’t quite jump, staring at the air next to the General where the voice had come from.

“Excuse me?” she asked, looking between the General and empty space, “General, did you hear that?”

“It was the older man wearing black, Vice-Admiral,” Finn said, “But if I could have your name for the record, sir?”

“Luke Skywalker. You must be Finn, Rey’s mentioned you.”

“You can _see_ him?” she demanded of her assistant, squinting at the empty air.

“Force sensitive, as I suspected,” Leia sighed, jabbing empty air with her cane and scowling, “It’s very annoying that you’re selectively tangible right now.”

“Selectively – you’re a _ghost_?”

“The technical term is Force projection – one moment, I should be able to fix – oh, _that’s_ how that works, that explains - “

Suddenly, someone was _there_ and the few who hadn’t noticed the odd conversation in the middle of the secondary bridge definitely noticed a mysteriously appearing person next to their General, blasters appearing in hand before Holdo barked, “Stand down! Ally! Also, you’d probably just shoot us.”

“Rey did find you, then?” Finn asked, hardly looking up from his notes, “Is she okay?”

“That, Finn, is a very good question,” the General said. “And unfortunately, she is probably currently being escorted to Snoke by Kylo Ren.”

She had to catch the datapad when Finn dropped it and she couldn’t blame him – he’d lost so much time and put so much effort into saving this girl already…

“How?” she demanded for him, looking to Skywalker, “How did they capture her?”

“She launched herself out of one of the Millenium Falcon’s escape pods into their hangar bay,” Skywalker grumbled, “Prompted by a Force vision, probably faked but it’s hard to differentiate between them even with extensive training.”

Finn froze for a moment before his lips thinned and he just kept taking notes.

She let her heart ache for a moment, because he wasn’t even suggesting a frantic rescue. He’d tried so hard to save her last time, sacrificed a chance to escape, risked his life multiple times, faced down the enemy he’d risked everything to run from and here she was, walking right back into the sarlacc pit.

Some people didn’t want to be saved, and it was terrible that he’d run into that so soon.

“That’s one reason I came here,” Leia said, and she focused back on her General, “Clarifying chain of command. You’re remaining in command of the evacuation. I’m going to get the pair of us onto a transport and Luke thinks between the two of us we can get through Snoke’s shielding and let his projection interfere in whatever encounter is going on. At the very least we can try.”

“I’ve never actually done this projection bit before,” Skywalker admitted, “I’m making this up as I go, but it should be possible.”

“Would an additional Force sensitive help?” she asked, eyeing Finn thoughtfully, because he _had_ seen Skywalker before she’d been able too.

“...actually, his connection to Rey might make a difference,” Skywalker admitted.

“Finn, accompany General Organa and Master Skywalker to transport – three, it’s done loading gear so there shouldn’t be much going on with it besides personnel loading. Dameron’s finished so grab him and some of his pilots to form a guard to keep you from being disturbed. Take the pad with you, I’ll keep notes and we can synchronize them if there’s time, if not, you’ll have the most complete record of bridge-happenings in these last hours. Understood?”

“Yes Vice-Admiral,” Finn said, offering a very careful salute and casting glances to some point over her shoulder.

In the reflection of the nearest screen, she could see one of the human lieutenants saluting, showing him the proper Resistance form for his species and another one giving a thumbs-up since he’d gotten it right. Good, he had more allies than Dameron at this point. Returning the salute, she said, “May the Force be with you, Finn.”

“...And with you?” he managed, dropping the salute and she could see the Lieutenant mouthing something – probably trying to prompt the correct response.

“Good lip-reading skills,” she praised, letting herself give him a sly smile when he flushed, “That could be useful going forward. Thank you, Lieutenant,” she called over her shoulder.

Turning to Leia and the now invisible Skywalker – a good idea, seeing him randomly walk the halls when they all knew very damn well no ships had come in – she let herself take a few moments to exchange a proper farewell with her General.

If they couldn’t figure out the autopilot, it would be her job to make the hyperspace attack.

**Author's Note:**

> Might continue, have some ideas, might not. Basically wanted to take Finn and Rose's plotline and smash it to bits because it was completely unnecessary and made things worse for the Resistance over all, and it was so very easy to divert. Hope you enjoyed!
> 
> Also, I apparently adore Holdo?! She became very fun to write, might have to let her live...


End file.
